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Bills target domestic and livestock groundwater exemption...
The importance of the exemption for domestic and livestock wells for landowners gains importance as more and more groundwater conservation districts are created.
This exemption prevents local districts from regulating or assessing a fee on anyone that cannot pump more than 25,000 gallons per day on a tract of land larger than 10 acres. It is an exemption that has been near and dear to the members of Texas Farm Bureau for many years.
Unfortunately, two bills have been filed in the Texas Legislature to amend or completely repeal the exemption in two groundwater conservation districts. Normally, we wouldn't get very excited about bills that only deal with a local district. However, this domestic and livestock well exemption is so important that any bill that attempts to weaken it must be taken seriously.
H.B. 1229 by Rep. Harvey Hilder-bran allows the Menard County Groundwater Conservation District to require a permit for certain domestic and livestock wells. The bill targets wells that are on less than 100 acres, less than 500 feet deep, and cannot pump more than 9,000 gallons per day.
The other bill that affects the exemption is S.B. 839 by Sen. Jeff Wentworth. S.B. 839 completely removes the exemption for domestic and livestock wells in Kendall County, currently served by Cow Creek Groundwater Conservation District. Landowners who own less than 10 acres are regulated by the district under current law. This group of small-acreage landowners has protested the fact that they are regulated, while landowners with more than 10 acres are not. Particularly, they are opposed to being the only domestic and livestock well owners paying fees to the local district. Senator Wentworth's solution is to place all domestic and livestock wells under the regulation of the district. And of course, all landowners with domestic and livestock wells will pay fees to the district if the legislation passes.
On behalf of our membership, Texas Farm Bureau is opposed to these bills—even though they only affect a local district.
Passage of this type of legislation would set a precedent for other areas or regions of the state. If this trend continued, eventually our statewide exemption for domestic and livestock wells would be meaningless.
The moral of this story? If we don't pay attention to all water policy in Texas—local or not—we may find that agriculture and landowners have lost their rights to water a little bit at a time.
